what does damage reduction mean?

i see some pets give like 2.5% damage reduction. does is mean that suppose a player did me 100 damage but because of 2.5% dmg reduction i received 97.5damage? that is so less. if a rogue crits me 1000 ill only get damage reduced my 25. so i came to think my idea on dmg reduction is wrong.

what does damage reduction mean? can anyone explain me?

i would like the answer to be from pvp point of view.

thank you.

also one thing i dont understand is armour vs hp. how much armour can i afford to lose for gaining a certain amount of hp. in pve small data doesnt affect much but in pvp one mistake is equal to one death.

thank you

This thread has a very interesting graph that shows how much damage reduction you get from the amount of armor you have.

http://www.spacetimestudios.com/show...ction-Analysis

armor = dmg reduction
more armor = more dmg reduction
(more armor helps for tanks, and less for mages)
this stacks with pet dmg reduct and lix

hp is raw hp

here are some links the graph is wierd

http://www.spacetimestudios.com/show...oes-armor-work

http://www.spacetimestudios.com/show...-dexterity-add

http://www.spacetimestudios.com/show...rmor-Valuation

Since Carapace has commented in this thread that Zylx hit quite close to bullseye in his observation of the relationship between armor and damage reduction, I'd say the info presented there is very legit.

What's not discussed is how raw damage reduction % stacks with damage reduction from armor. Does damage reduction % kick in after armor damage reduction has been factored in, or is it before? Or are they additive? Each scenario will give different calculations for how to arrive at a damage reduction/armor/hp balance for your toon. It's likely it will take some number crunching and graph-generating to arrive at this...

Damage Reduction reduces the amount of damage by a flat percentage. So in your example of 2.5%, this could be the equivalent of 100 armor points, or 500 armor points depending on your level. It does stack with your regular armor in the sense that it's additional damage reduction on top of your armor calculated damage reduction.

For a quick example:
(these are bogus numbers not real ones ;) )

If I had 1000 armor, and 2.5% damage reduction from a pet at level 20, then I would receive say 24% damage reduction from the 1000 armor AND 2.5% from the Damage Reduction, for a total reduction of 26.5%.